Field of the Invention
The invention relates, in general, to ammunition and propellants and, in particular, to a new and useful pyrotechnic composition with a mixture of metallic reducing agents, inorganic oxidizing agents and possibly further additions in a delay tubule.
Similar delay compositions are known. The substance mixture is pressed into the delay tubule and the reducing agent(s) and oxidizing agent(s) are so laid out that the mixture burns with the least possible release of gaseous reaction products. The release of hot gases is nevertheless not entirely avoided. On the other hand, the burning down of the propellant composition is temperature and pressure dependent. The hot gases stored in the delay composition enclosed by a delay tubule therefore influence the reaction kinetics, and thus the delay time. This has, in particular when longer burning compositions are used, a negative effect.
As explained above, this behaviour cannot be eliminated by choice of mixture, since a totally gas-less reaction is not yet available. For decreasing the gas generation, decreasing the diameter of the delay composition cannot be applied indefinitely. For, through such a decrease, the heat transmission from the burning delay composition via the delay tubule to the surrounding is increased, which also affects delay time and, in the extreme case, can lead to an extinction of the delay composition.